Number: HARD-015 Description: How does the rising cost of prescription medication affect the elderly community? Narrative: Documents concerning members of the elderly and/or retired community and their ability/inability to afford adequate prescription medication are on-topic. Information regarding why the cost of medication is so high, is on-topic, in addition to the impact this issue has had on the elderly community. Documents dealing with other immuno-compromised communities (i.e., AIDS comm.) are off-topic. item=purpose, value=Details item=genre, value=Any item=granularity, value=Passage item=familiarity, value=2 http://www.house.gov/murtha/health/drugfact.htm The convergence of the two trends described in this report -- growing relianceon prescription drugs by the elderly and mounting costs for those drugs -- is a crisis for America's senior citizens. The elderly already pay a significant portion of prescription drug expenditures out of pocket. Today, many seniors are without any prescription drug coverage. For those fortunate enough to have prescription drug coverage, that coverage is diminishing. Thus, unless seniors are assured of prescription drug coverage through Medicare, many will find that needed medications are unaffordable. Annotator I find it upsetting that requisite medication for the elderly may be unavailable to them due to lack of medical coverage or simply due to the exorbitant cost of the medication. not for this topic English; French; Italian 23 Female